Yesterday I raised my ethical concerns about a White woman writing an academic paper involving the struggles of Women of Color in the feminist blogosphere. I asked:
Would it be ethical if a White woman bases an academic dissertation on the struggles of feminist Women of Color bloggers, profusely quoting them, the comments in their blog(s), the multitude of different put downs they have faced but not once does this academic mention having consent from the people involved to do so? Especially when the person in question (the writer) is trying to build some sort of reputation/ career as a feminist writer herself?
I didn’t put up a link to the paper yesterday because I wanted to make sure I wasn’t overreacting or “seeing things”. Instead, I opened a discussion about the ethics of doing this. I got many answers. I also shared with a few people, in private, the link to the paper in question. They all agreed (and each with a different reason) that my concerns were valid and definitely not unfounded.
So here is the link to the paper: Building a Better (Critical Democratic) Speech Culture: Feminist Blogs and Freedom of Speech by Erin Michelle Dean. (link goes to PDF)
The paper is dated November 2011, so it is quite recent. However, it covers events in the feminist blogosphere that took place in 2008. It features, in varying degrees of prominence and amount of quotes, the words, blog posts, comments and online histories of:
- brownfemipower
- Blackamazon
- Amanda Marcotte
- Jessica Valenti
- Jill Filipovic
- Hugo Schwyzer
- Latoya Peterson
- Angry Black Woman
- The Curvature
and many, MANY MANY MORE… too many to cite (I am just giving a rundown of some of the names).
Now, here are a few observations I need to make about why this is very problematic and why I am bringing it to a wider attention:
Nowhere in this paper, does the author mention that she contacted the people involved to get consent for this research. At least one of the people quoted has confirmed that she wasn’t aware of her inclusion in this paper and that she wasn’t asked if she was OK with it. This would probably be less important if the author wasn’t an active participant in the feminist communities she is studying. In these communities, she presents herself as a peer (who even has a Tumblr). However, the author does not implicate herself as neither participant or observer in this community, specifically, as a White feminist blogger. To quote an academic editor who did read this last night and had this to say:
a disclaimer on identity and her own fallacy as an observer would, to me, position the following inquiry as less problematic simply because people can choose whether or not to take a White woman’s observation of the events seriously or not.
The author, instead, presents herself as an “objective” observer who has no vested interest in the community . Worse so, she fails to address how she is also part of the problem she seeks to study: namely, how feminist Women of Color bloggers have to struggle with issues of appropriation and silencing by White feminist bloggers.
Now, the second thing that bothers me as a feminist writer is the one about consent. I mentioned above how at least one of the people quoted stated that she was not a willing participant. We might argue that consent is not necessary as all of this was in the public view, right? Not so. At least two of the people involved, brownfemipower and “Off our pedestals” have deleted their blogs since the events described took place. At least one of them, brownfemipower, issued a statement about her withdrawal from the public discussions. Her reasons to do so are neither here nor there (and neither it is up to us to discuss them). However, it was clear that she did not wish to engage in a public forum any further. Ms. Dean found a workaround to still have access to the blog entries from brownfemipower: she found the cache kept at Archive.org’s Wayback Machine. Now, from an academic perspective, this might as well be acceptable. However, from a purely feminist standpoint, I must ask “Didn’t the wishes of the author to remove herself from public scrutiny count for anything?”. Shouldn’t those wishes, specifically in a feminist context be taken into account? How can the author, who self identifies as a feminist, not take this in consideration when doing her research? Moreover, more than fifty pages are devoted to the events that led to brownfemipower’s self removal from the public eye. Shouldn’t that have been a hint for the author that a woman’s wishes are to be respected? And more specifically, when there is absolute no mention of brownfemipower’s agreement to be part of this research. (I need to point to my statement above, at least one of the women quoted has confirmed that this was done without her awareness or consent). Again, I insist, this might all be well from an academic research perspective but as feminists, why aren’t the feminist ethics of such an appropriation taken into account?
That all of the above is done by a White feminist blogger further problematizes the issue. In attempting to analyze the many ways in which WoC have their works appropriated and misused, the author does the very same thing she claims to be against.
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